A La Carte (17 page)

A glance around the well-lit lobby and panic hits my stomach. I step into the entrance of the dining room, and waves of humiliation break over me. Not only has this been the worst dinner ever, it looks like Topher has ditched me. I hurry back to the porch, down the stairs, and into the parking lot. The van isn't there.

I can feel my chin quivering. I must look like I'm about six and lost, and I hate myself for it, for being lost, for being so stupid as to get left behind, and for getting weepy about it. What do I do now? There's no cell service. I don't know the number to the cabin. I wasn't thinking I'd ever have to know it. I feel stupid and unprepared. Even if I could find a bus or a taxi, who knows where the cabin is?

There's a breeze kicking up, and the headlights of occasional cars are the biggest illumination out here between the yellowy streetlights, high above the road. I watch the road for a few minutes before I realize there's nothing else to do. I start walking.

There are no stars out yet, so there is nothing to wish on. I trip on the toe of my shoe and stumble. A car comes up behind me, windows down. Music jangles on the quiet night air, and someone yells, “Have a nice trip! See you next fall!” followed by hoots and laughter.

If I could ball myself up and become invisible, I would.

Every time headlights come around the corner, I cringe. A blocky little minivan does a U-turn behind me, and I hear my name.

“Elaine!”

I wait for another car to pass, then cross the road quickly. Topher glares at me as he pushes open the door. “What the hell are you doing?! I've been looking for you for fifteen minutes!”

“Me? I didn't go anywhere until I saw you'd left!”

“I ‘left'? I didn't leave! I even made some girl look for you in the bathroom.” Topher is livid. “Jeez, Elaine.”

“I just stood on the porch. I didn't see you….” My voice trails away.

Topher blows out a sigh. “Whatever. Get in the car.” He doesn't say anything else to me all the way back, and the distance to the cabin seems longer than I remember.

This is the worst, worst,
worst
time I have had with anyone in my whole life. I am sick, but I can't throw up. There is no way to rid me of myself, which is all that's making me ill. I can't believe how badly this has gone. I can't believe the mess I've made.

When we reach the cabin, there are white lights twinkling along the deck. Cars are lined up along the street. The Haineses are throwing a party, I remember, and my stomach knots. How am I supposed to walk into the hallway and through the living room to be examined by a whole host of strangers before I can reach the safety of my room? I think I might be sick for real.

Topher puts the car in park and snatches out the keys. It takes him a moment to realize that I'm not moving. He leans back impatiently, hand on the wheel.

“Are you just going to sit there?”

“No.”

“Well, get out, then.” Topher's voice is mean.

I know I should thank him for dinner, but there's really no good spin to put on this night. I feel like my head is trapped in a vise. “Topher, look—”

Topher slams the door. “Save it, Elaine.”

I jerk open my door and stand to face him. “You're not being fair! Topher, I didn't know what happened to you, okay? I didn't know! Do you think I'd be sitting here defending that or, or, applauding because you got arrested?”

“I don't know what you'd do.” Topher stops, keys clenched in his fist. “I really have no idea.”

“Well, I wouldn't. I'm sorry it happened, Topher.”

“‘It' happened? What's ‘it'? The probation? The random drug tests? The drug possession that's now on my record? Do you know I might have to wait a year now to apply for college? That I might have lost all my student loans? Which ‘it' are you sorry happened, Elaine?”

I am shaking. Topher leans close, still spitting venom.

“Nothing's ever going to be the same for me, Elaine, nothing. So, don't you stand there and say your little ‘sorrys' to me.”

“I didn't know.” My voice is barely above a whisper. “He didn't invite me to the party….” I look up. “Topher, didn't you tell somebody? Didn't you tell your parents it was him?”

Topher rolls his eyes. “Laine, who are they gonna believe, me or some lawyer's kid? The cops weren't listening to anybody that night. I didn't tell anybody anything. It was my fault for believing he'd have my back. Keller's never had anybody's back but his own.”

Topher blows out a sigh. “Anyway.” He turns back toward the house, then looks back at me, shaking his head as if to clear it. “It's not…I didn't mean to blow up at you anyway. It's just…I can't stand that you would be with somebody like him.”

“I…wasn't. He just…He's changed a lot since junior high.”

“I have too, Elaine.” Topher's voice is raw. “Do you think you'll ever see that?”

“I—I don't…Topher, I…”

The screen door slaps, and I jump. Someone comes out of the house, and light shows in the open doorway.

“Oh, hey! You're back!”

I know what this must look like—Topher and me standing in the dark by the car. I look at Topher. Mr. Haines will see I look like I've been crying, and we need to get our stories straight before we go in. Mom's going to want to hear all about how great a time we had, and neither of us looks happy enough to pull that off.

“Hey, Dad. We just got here,” Topher says.

“Oh. Well.” Mr. Haines glances back over his shoulder and comes down the stairs. “Did you get the steak?”

Topher nods. “Like always.”

Mr. Haines crosses the yard, slowly approaching the car. “So, what are you two going to do now? Your mom dug up some slides….”

“Oh, Lord,” Topher groans.

Mr. Haines grins. “She's showing the trip to Budapest and Hungary we took two years ago. I'd almost forgotten you had braces, Toph.”

Topher's mouth tightens. “Dad.”

“Well, you never know. Maybe Laine would like to—”

Laine would not like to do anything but escape, thank you.

“Actually, I was just going up to bed.” Is that my voice that sounds so weird?

Mr. Haines is deliberately hearty. He leans on the hood, peering into my face. “You sure you want to do that? Do you play pool? How about we get out some old video games or pull out another movie from the archives?”

I know he sees that I've been crying. Why won't he leave me alone? “I think I'll just go upstairs.”

“You sure? Lainey, you're our guest. We'd love to have your company.” There's something in Mr. Haines's voice.

“Dad.” Topher sounds resigned. “I'll play pool with you.”

Mr. Haines looks up hopefully at me. “Lainey? You sure you don't want our company?”

Don't want his company? What can I say? “I…I'll go change.”

“Great! When you come down, we might talk Ana into making some divinity,” Mr. Haines calls over his shoulder, walking away. “It's good stuff.”

My legs are trembling as I walk up the stairs. I'm not up to being good company. I don't want to try. And Mr. Haines's transformation from a quiet, geeky engineer to a man bent on turning me into a happy camper exhausts me.

I am glad to close the door on the sounds of the party, but Ana knocks on my door a few minutes later and calls out that she'll meet me in the kitchen. When I open the door, I hear Mr. Haines tell the group in the living room that Ana's divinity is not to be missed. When I step into the hallway, Topher is there.

“Elaine.” His voice is hushed. “About my parents. My dad…he thinks I went to Sim's party and all because he and Mom didn't pay enough attention to me. So, the pool thing…You don't have to play if you don't want to. Dad's just been…making sure we spend time and stuff.” He shrugs.

“Oh, Topher.” I take a shaky breath. “I'm sorry.” I swallow. “I'll play. I at least owe you a game of pool for ruining your evening, don't I?”

Topher raises his chin, mouth taut, slate eyes unsmiling. “You don't owe me
anything.
”

I half smile. “Yeah, I know. And that's why it'll be fun beating you.”

A faint smile softens Topher's face. He shakes his head. “We'll see.”

As it turns out, the evening is not so bad. Playing with an engineer and his son, I lose—badly—at pool. Ana makes her noxiously sweet divinity, which people apparently love, even though it's the consistency of hardening glue. Mr. Haines heats up the last few pieces of last night's dessert, the peach apple crisp, and insists that everyone have a microscopic taste. I get lots of polite adult praise, but I know no one could have had a bite big enough to appreciate it. On a positive note, one guy, Michael Something-or-other, says he'd like to taste something else I make sometime. He works for a newspaper in the Bay Area. Maybe he'll come up and do a nice write-up for Mom.

I throw myself into faking a good time. By evening's end, Topher's happier, Mom is beaming, and the Haineses think I'm “such a nice girl.”

Mission accomplished, right?

16

Just a few days ago, I would have called you crazy for saying I'd miss Christopher Haines for
any
reason, but I'm not looking forward to a three-hour ride home from Yosemite with just Mom. Though the last day or two of vacation was at least a nominal cease-fire, Mom still hasn't given up the idea that she should organize my life as well as she organizes the spices in the cabinet at home. She's been bugging me about finding an internship again, asking what plans Topher has for his life, and even asking me if I ever heard Simeon talk about what he wanted to do in life, as if she can subtly discover his whereabouts.

In the car, I brace for another round of Vivianne Seifert's Twenty Questions, but Mom surprises me this time by not asking me anything. She puts on the stereo and we listen to, ridiculously, a relaxation CD, bubbling brooks interspersed with wafting flutes. By the time we're out of Yosemite Valley, it's like water torture. I need a bathroom, and I'm fighting back giggles.

“Mom. Are you tense? 'Cause all this water makes me have to pee.”

Mom's mouth twitches. “Sorry. I thought it would help.”

I find myself smiling. “Thanks…. But I don't need any ‘help.' I'm fine.”

Mom flicks a glance at me sideways. “Are you?”

“Not really, but who is?” I shrug. “It's just life, Mom.”

“Can we talk about it?” my mother asks gently. And then her phone rings.

“Answer it.”

Mom gives me an incredulous look. “Not on your life! Lainey, you are far more important to me than anyone on the other end of that line. Believe me, it can wait.”

“But…” I don't really have anything to say. “It's nothing, Mom. Answer the phone.”

For a moment, Mom's shoulders slump, but then she straightens. “I'm going to keep asking, Lainey,” she says. “I'm asking because I love you.”

“I know, Mom,” I say. “Answer the phone.”

Mom sighs and punches the button to activate her headset.

I'm relieved. I don't want to talk to Mom anymore about Simeon. She's going to say he wasn't a good influence for me or something like that, that I'm a “great girl” and I'll find someone who meets my high standards, blah blah. The thing is, his leaving still hurts, and what Topher told me hurts worse. I'm just not ready for the “lemons make lemonade” pep talk yet.

Mom stays on the phone all the way home. For the first time, I realize how much she's put off to spend time with me. There are restaurant people and wedding coordinators and others who have left messages for her already today. There's a food magazine that wants a shot of a certain dish and needs to schedule people. In between calls Mom's been making voice memos to herself about things to do later. Once, I clear my throat, and she stops talking to glance at me.

“Did you want to say something?”

“Umm…no.”

A sigh. “Laine? Is there a specific reason you don't want to talk to me?”

My stomach twists. “You want to fix everything…. Plus, you don't like him.”

“I didn't know we were talking about ‘him.'” She says it mildly, but I still react.

“We're not. But…I don't want you to say ‘I told you so.'”

A pause. “When have I ever said that I don't like Simeon?”

“Well, you don't. You acted like I was wasting my time by being friends with him.”

Mom sighs and changes lanes. “Remember when I told you that a great girl like you would find all kinds of people to appreciate her someday? I meant that. Elaine, it's
never
a waste to be a friend to someone, and I've never objected to you being a friend to Simeon. What I've objected to is you pretzeling yourself around what he wants to the point that you're cutting me off and changing who you are.”

“I haven't changed,” I say defensively. “I'm the same person I always was.”

“So this time last year you were someone who lied to me and withdrew from my bank account without telling me? No. Don't you see? Lainey, you compromised my trust. You put Simeon's wants above your own knowledge of what was right. And now”—she grimaces—“you keep wondering why I can't get past it. You know why I can't? Because I don't think you understand yet how serious this was. What else are you willing to do for a friend, Elaine? How much are you willing to give away?”

There's an uncomfortable silence. Mom breaks it.

“I love you, Lainey. You know I do. And I'm sorrier than you know that Simeon is gone and there's no resolution for you. I won't say I'm not relieved you're no longer involved with him, but it's not about
him,
Lainey. My concern is all about you.”

Was that an “I told you so”? Or did I already know that?

 

It's the last week for pea shoots. Mom, Pia, and the sous-chef have discussed changing some items on the menu to later-spring dishes, like grilled vegetables, but I still find myself with a sink full of the delicate greens, washing them carefully. I feel like I've been standing elbow deep in water for the last week, but I'm happy to be back in the kitchen.

Mom decided that I don't need to check in with her at the restaurant anymore, but I've been coming in every evening anyway, mostly because being alone in the house gives me too much time to think. I stay up late and sleep in. I watch reruns of
Baking with Julia,
and I flip through my notebooks, Mom's cookbooks, and all my food magazines to find something new to create every day. I even make a time-consuming mu shu, from the thin pancakes to the filling to the sauce. There are still too many hours to fill.

There hasn't been any word from Simeon, and the number I had for him has been disconnected. The gray spy car wasn't here when we got home. It's like he no longer exists. I don't know what to think.

Every night, I walk, taking a roundabout way to La Salle, and try to get everything out of my system. It's really starting to hit me that I have nothing to do, no one to try to organize but myself. I'm slowly starting to take the idea of an internship seriously. I'll probably need to find a paying internship, since I doubt I'll see Simeon again with my money, and Mom's account isn't open to me anymore. Suddenly the shape of the future looks really, really different, and I don't know how I feel about it. Life—real life—is approaching fast.

I walk with quick, determined steps, and I'm a block past the hospital before I start to slow down. It's a warm night in San Rosado. People are just getting home from work, and there's a banner over the road, between Sophie Lane and Mulberry, advertising the First Street Festival to coincide with the farmers' markets again this season.

There's a crowd in front of Copperfield's, sitting at the open-air tables and chatting. I can smell coffee mingling with the harsher smell of smoke as people unwind with their newspapers and cell phones. A bunch of guys look like they're actually playing some kind of board game while they're drinking their coffee. A huge pair of dice with something like fourteen sides clatters off the table. One of the guys dives into my path to grab it.

“Sorry.” I give him a half smile and keep going. He's kind of cute, in a completely mad-scientist, antisocial way, but it makes me depressed that he's outside on a nice evening playing a game with a bunch of geeky guys. Where's the romance in the world?

There's a vendor in front of Soy to the World, selling tie-dyed scarves and dolphin toe rings. I sidestep her warily. All I need is someone trying to talk to me about peace and love. I know my walk is turning into a pity party, but I can't help it. I feel like everything that
could
unravel with my life
has.

Everywhere I look, there are people wandering out in the balmy evening air, looking happy with their world and completely absorbed in their friends. The library is having a used-book sale, and I stop for a moment to browse. I'm always on the lookout for old cookbooks. I flip through a few, then sigh and keep walking. Even cooking doesn't seem worthwhile.

Tonight the restaurant seems foreign to me. I feel like I'm in the way. Mom and Pia are busy, running around and making special orders. Ming asked if I've found my internship yet, and Gene wanted to hear about my college choices, but things got busy when a huge party came in and everyone had to move tables and recheck the menu to accommodate food allergies. One of the diners is allergic to
lettuce.
Seriously.

By the time the rush is over, I've paced Mom's office like a caged panther, gone down to the kitchen twice to watch everyone running around, and refused a plate when Pia offered me one, and now I'm standing at the back door, watching the little slice of sky visible from the alley where the busboys take their smoke breaks. The clouds have rolled in. It's threatening to rain or at least get unpleasantly foggy and make my hair frizz up all over my head.

My mother appears next to me and puts her hand on my shoulder. The two of us stand quietly, watching the storm come.

I keep hearing what Mom said to me, about how much I'm willing to give away to keep a friend. Was I willing to trade
her
? Was she just being overdramatic? I'd like to think so, but I remember how I felt when I thought Simeon needed me. When I start thinking that Mom's got it all wrong, I remember how good it felt, how much it filled me, and then I wonder…is she right?

 

The first week back to school always sucks, but this first week of the last grading period is really “craptacular,” as Cheryl says. For one thing, it's the beginning of senior countdown, and all I see everywhere is signs about the prom, the Last Dance, which is Redgrove's cheap and casual all-school party for those who can't afford the prom, and all final projects, final tests, and final everythings. The eight weeks ahead loom like an overstuffed burrito; niceties like time to sleep, put on makeup, or eat seem to have fallen messily by the wayside. Every night that I'm not at the restaurant, I'm at a tutoring session for either physics or trigonometry.

The good news is that I got into the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco, starting in the summer if I want it or fall if I don't, and I got in at Mills College with an “undeclared” major, and I'm wait-listed for UC Berkeley. The bad news is, our teachers keep saying that acceptance letters are no guarantee if our grades tank these last few weeks, so I know I'd better keep on top of things. When I find out that Cheryl is a tutor for English lit, I wonder briefly what it would take to bribe her into writing my last paper for me. Cheryl just laughs when I ask her.

Vocal Jazz has added even more urgency to life with an impending performance. Our upcoming spring show means that zero period turns into boot camp each morning and Ms. Dunston puts us through our paces.

The second week after break, I get a letter from the
Just Tomatoes
contest I entered. It is polite, a “thank you for taking the time to enter our contest, your entry was very creative” type of form letter, but a rejection is a rejection no matter how nicely they put it. This is kind of the last straw. I am so depressed I don't even go to the gym, even though I know the corn bread I baked from scratch for last night and the bag of kettle corn I bought at the cafeteria snack shop on Friday have made themselves at home in my body somewhere. What makes it worse is that the kettle corn didn't even taste all that good.

As is the tradition at Redgrove, the seniors “surprise” Ms. Dunston at our last Vocal Jazz rehearsal before the show. One of the tenors, who went to Hawaii with his family for break, brings a two-pound box of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts. Ms. Dunston opens the box at the end of class, and I am feeling so crappy I eat three pieces. There are 204 calories in an
ounce
of plain macadamia nuts. I don't even want to know how many calories there are if you add chocolate. I only hope I can fit into my Jazz uniform one last time.

Backstage at the spring show Friday night has the feel of the kitchen at La Salle. Between numbers, the jazz band plays swing music, and we can hear the audience applauding soloists, dancers, and instrumentalists. Every few minutes some minor drama breaks out, and hysterical giggling is shushed or someone starts sniffling or rushes off to the bathroom. The theater girls, in copper satin dresses, are clustered in front of mirrors, pinning fake white roses in their hair for the final piece. The Vocal Jazz group, the girls in hideous teal dresses and the guys in matching vests, is just getting ready for its cue. We're holding no music, no props, nothing. Our final performance is like a prix fixe menu, a smorgasbord of the year's performances, and only Ms. Dunston, chic in a little black dress with diamond pins in her hair, knows what our encore will be. This performance counts for a third of our grade.

“Hey, Laine.” Topher is standing next to me, looking cautious. “Good luck tonight.”

I smile over at him. The teal makes his dark gray eyes stand out. “You too. I just hope we don't have to sing ‘Java Jive' for the encore.”

Topher opens his mouth to say something else, but Ms. Dunston hisses, “Places!” and all chattering ends as we quickly shift into position. I catch Topher's smile and return his quick thumbs-up. This is it—our last song.

Applause washes over us as we stride onstage. Of course, Mom took an hour or so off from La Salle, and I look out into the audience, blinded by the footlights and flashes from hundreds of cameras, hoping to see her. As my eyes wander over the darkened auditorium, I glimpse someone standing by the side entrance, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. My brain identifies Simeon Keller long before my eyes do. I suck in a huge breath.

The basses start the first notes to Ellington's “It Don't Mean a Thing,” and I'm caught off guard. I glance at Ms. Dunston, and she's pointing at the altos. We come in, our “doo-wop, doo-wop, doo-wop” synchronized perfectly with the tenors, just like we've practiced. I snap my fingers with the rest of my section on cue, but my stomach is roiling. What's he doing here? Was that really him?